SANTA BARBARA, Calif.—Thursday the Coastal Commission voted 9 to 2 in favor of imposing penalties against Sable offshore.
“The people in the Commission staff and on the Coastal Commission are very frustrated that they've been trying to work cooperatively with a company that hasn't been working with them at all,” said Brady Bradshaw from the Center for Biological Diversity.
For months, environmentalists have been urging the Coastal Commission to hold Sable Offshore accountable for what they say is a clear violation of a stop work order and irreversible damage of the surrounding habitat.
But Sable executives and workers remain firm that the work they’ve done is covered under existing permits. Others added that the Coastal Commission staff is going beyond what it has jurisdiction over. “Despite the commission itself delegating permitting authority of the Coastal Act to local governments. The actions taken recently by the Coastal Commission staff suggest that they no longer intend to honor those agreements for local governments within the coastal zone,” said one pro-Sable speaker. Workers like Eric Dafoe say that there’s a lot of good that will come from a project like this— not just for themselves and their families, but also for the local economy and consumers.
“People overlook that so much. They always look at the oil. They don't look at the 3,000/4,000 byproducts that come from it,” said the Sable Worker.
It all came to a halt Thursday. Sable now faces an $18 million dollar penalty, an order to restore the environment it allegedly damaged, and a long term cease- and- desist order. “They imposed the maximum penalty, so that shows how upset the Coastal Commission was. In fact, several commissioners said they were so frustrated, they said, ‘We don't have to be here. We shouldn't be here. If Sable had just follow the law, submitted its applications to do all this work on the Gaviota Coast, they might have had permits by now,’” said Linda Krop from the Environmental Defense Center.
In terms of next steps, environmentalists say they hope the Attorney General steps in to make sure Sable is unable to restart this pipeline.
California Coastal Commission slams Sable Offshore with $18 million dollar fine News Channel 3-12.
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